


I've grown familiar, with villains that live in my head

by heavenisalibrary



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-21
Updated: 2015-09-21
Packaged: 2018-04-22 19:50:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,051
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4848254
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/heavenisalibrary/pseuds/heavenisalibrary
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“You want me to be happy,” River said, “so you don’t feel so guilty. And you want me to be good, so you can imagine that there’s some hope for someone whose ledger is as red as yours. I am happy, honey, and I don’t kill for sport and I try to do the best I can with what I have to work with, but you need to either trust me, always, or not do it at all.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	I've grown familiar, with villains that live in my head

**Author's Note:**

> This is a bit bleak. It's also a bit uneven, as I've been writing it over quite a long period of time. Thanks to goddessdel for her notes once upon a time, and much credit to that Moffat quote about how River loves her parents and loves her fella and the rest of the universe can go hang, because that was pretty much where this came from.

Skip looked a bit green, but that was mostly because his skin was a rather fluorescent shade of emerald -- the Doctor had meant it as a figure of speech, but realized slightly too late that it wasn’t the right one to use. He hadn’t _meant_ to take his companion into a highly volatile situation filled with dozens of variables he had no control over -- although he never did, even though it seemed to happen a lot -- but Skip wanted to play poker. And so the Doctor took him to a poker game in the year 4639 on a planet where Skip’s green skin and orange eyes and four horns wouldn’t go amiss. He probably should have done a bit more research, though, because instead of a fun game night, the Doctor had accidentally -- he was starting to think part of him did these things on purpose, though -- taken him to a high-stakes poker game run by the mafia-equivalent of the planet they were on, and in forging their credentials to get them too the table, had maybe sort of inadvertently given Skip the psychic paper that led them to believe that Skip was an important player in a rival gang and, well, the whole thing was an enormous mess, and the Doctor was barely even a passable poker player, but losing wasn’t an option. He’d be led out of the room and poor Skip would probably be whacked before the door even closed. At least the Doctor’s psychic paper had said he was a government official. They’d hold off on any real violence until he left.  
  
Still — he sighed at his hand — not exactly a good situation.  
  
He should’ve just left Skip on his home planet. Even if Clara would only travel with him a day a week, he didn’t _need_ to find company when he was alone. He could just _be alone_ — he must’ve done it at one point, he was over one thousand years old. The Doctor tugged at his bow tie, tapping his foot anxiously as the other players all took their turns. Thick-necked, strong-jawed, dim-eyed humanoids with wings tucked beneath their leather jackets and retractable claws the size of a baby’s arm.  
  
Alright, so it was a _horrific_ situation.  
  
And he was trying to find a way out of it, but they all relied on him staying in the game at least for another hand, and it was hard to concentrate both on cards and the people around him _and_ his card-playing relied heavily on his ability to read his competitors, which was one thing that the Doctor was not particularly good at. Of course, there were also meant to be some — he shifted uncomfortably in his seat — escorts coming at any moment, which added to the list of things the Doctor had to worry about.  
  
He heard the doors open, and if nothing else was relieved at the reprieve, because all of the men around the table looked up to focus on the handful of provocatively dressed women being corralled in. He was so distracted trying to keep his cool as they settled into the laps and draped themselves over various poker players that he didn’t even notice the woman corralling them until she slammed the door behind her.  
  
“Behave, boys,” River said, looking absolutely terrifying in black leather pants and boots she could probably use to kill someone with very little effort. “You know the rules. Treat my girls well and I’ll treat you well. Don’t and — well.” She grinned, and even the Doctor shivered. “Let’s not ruin the mood, hm?”  
  
There was some laughing and chattering, and Skip was no doubt looking askance at the Doctor, but all he could do was gape at River.  
  
“Not going to join the fun, Madame?” said one of the poker players, grinning lasciviously at her. The Doctor stomped on his foot beneath the table -- accidentally, of course -- and apologized under his breath.  
  
River hummed, sweeping her eyes over those in the room, considering her options. The Doctor _knew_ that she was running a game on somebody, and he _knew_ that she was his wife and that she’d picked him a thousand times over already, but he felt the truly insane and embarrassing urge to impress her, to make her pick _him_. He sat up straighter, closed his mouth, and ran a hand through his messy hair. Married for hundreds of years and still rubbing up against her leg for approval like some stupid housecat — he was the Doctor, millions said his name with reverence, et cetera, but he still found it impossible and improbable and so thrilling that River Song would deign to be his.  
  
When her eyes met his they softened slightly, and she shrugged.  
  
“May as well,” she said, casting a sharp eye to the player who had addressed her earlier, “if only to keep an eye on you.”  
  
She stalked toward the Doctor, waving off the couple of girls lingering nearby, and settled herself gracefully into his lap, her legs draped over his, and it was only because her hand was immediately holding his wrist that he didn’t drop his hand on the table without a care.  
  
“Hello sweetie,” she murmured. Skip leaned back so that the Doctor could see his bewildered expression over River’s shoulder, but she reached a hand up to fluff her hair, and quickly obscured his poor companion from view. “Not really your scene, is it?”  
  
The game was paused, at least momentarily, as everyone got to know their dates.  
  
“ _My_ scene? And since when are you a madame? Doesn’t sound like you at all. Though I do like the trousers.”  
  
She rolled her eyes. She smiled, carding a hand through his hair and leaning forward to whisper in his ear, “does it seem more fitting if I tell you they’re highly skilled assassins, not escorts?”  
  
She laughed as she pulled back, a bit too loudly, and he knew it was all for show. So he laughed too, and tried not to squirm too much as she nuzzled her nose against his cheek, pressing a quick kiss to his jaw.  
  
“Clever girl,” he said, “I actually might need your… er....”  
  
“Help?”  
  
He sighed. “ _Yes,_ fine. Help.”  
  
She raised a brow, sliding her hands under his jacket and smiling at him as he spoke, as though they were flirting. Her face was so close to his he’d barely have to move if he wanted to kiss her, and it was a hard thought to hold in mind while trying to save Skip’s life.  
  
“I may have gotten my companion in over his head,” the Doctor said.  
  
“The green fellow?”  
  
“How’d you know?”  
  
“He’s been staring at you like you grew a third head.”  
  
“I take offense to that,” the Doctor said. “My companions don’t always look at me like that.”  
  
“Honey,” River said, in that we-both-know-better-than-that tone he hated.  
  
He sighed. “Fine. But I’ve been very well behaved! This time, it might just be because he thinks I just let a prostitute sit in my lap.”  
  
“ _Escort_ ,” River corrected, sidling closer to him. He wrapped an arm around her, settling her comfortably against him, spreading his hand wide to rub gently up and down her back. “And the madame at that. At least you have expensive taste.”  
  
The Doctor snorted. “Well, at least while he’s focusing on my presumed debauchery, he’s not quite realized that if I lose this hand he’s probably going to be killed.”  
  
River giggled, and although he knew she was playacting to hide the seriousness of their conversation, the sound was so fetching on her that he leaned forward to kiss the side of her neck. She sighed, tilting her head to the side, and using the hand she had beneath his jacket to tangle in the fabric and pull him closer, encouraging him. He kissed her neck again, opening his mouth against her skin and sucking gently, feeling her fingers curl against him.  
  
“Best keep him unawares of quite the gravity of the situation then,” River said. He smiled at the hitch in her voice, feeling her swallow heavily as he nipped lightly at the center of her throat. “Anyway, it’s not a difficult fix. Our goals are aligned for once.”  
  
“And here I was worried I was going to have to outwit you as well,” the Doctor said, pulling back to look at River. Her eyes were dark and her cheeks were flushed, and he briefly regretted participating so devotedly in the necessary ruse of flirting with his presumed escort, but then, if they were _really_ flirting, they certainly wouldn’t be caught scheming, would they? River shifted her weight over his lap and he quickly grabbed her thigh to stop her as she smirked at him.  
  
“As if you could,” she said.  
  
“I have done,” he said.  
  
“I’ve let you think it,” River said. “What kind of rubbish wife would I be if I didn’t stroke my husband’s ego a little bit every now and then?” She reached a hand down to wrap over his where it rested on her thigh, caressing it gently and giving him the filthiest smile he’d ever seen, making him think of other things he’d _much_ rather her stroke.  
  
“ _River_ ,” he said, sounding more than a little pained. “Focus, please?”  
  
There was some grumbling and giggling, and the Doctor sensed everyone going back to their cards. Half the table was already palming their cards, and he sighed, trying to focus _himself_ — poor Skip was in very real danger, and all he could think about was how to distract everyone long enough to flirt with his wife a little more. She really was a terrible influence.  
  
“Don’t worry, honey,” River said, “everyone in this room is meant to be dead in the next ten minutes anyway. It’s all under control.”  
  
“That’s meant to relax me?” the Doctor said, trying to keep his voice down as he extricated himself from her a bit, partly because he needed to pick up his hand, and partly because he was abruptly concerned that River was far younger than he’d initially assumed, and he would end up having to outwit her after all.  
  
“It should do,” River said, “it’ll get your friend Skip out alive.” She leaned back, resting an arm against the back of his chair and peering at his cards over his shoulder, whispering in his ear. He was careful to smile slightly, as though what she was saying was sexy and not mildly horrifying.  
  
“There are a dozen people in here, River,” the Doctor said, “you can’t just _kill_ them.”  
  
“It’s the job,” River said. “You don’t know the context. You don’t know what they’ve done.”  
  
“I’m not sure there’s anything you could say that would validate that decision.”  
  
She pointed at one of his cards and winked at him, leaning in to nip at his earlobe, which was both thrilling and irritating, given the content of their conversation. He smiled at her, but he knew she’d see it didn’t reach his eyes.  
  
“These girls don’t work for wages,” River said, draping herself over him and whispering in his ear, “they were taken from their families as children by these men and their cohorts and forced into it.” She pressed a kiss to his neck, but the flush that he felt crawling up to his face was embarrassment at not having trusted her, not pleasure. “I’ve been here for months, off and on, taking over their house and training them to be quite effective at what I need them to do. Anything less than outright assassination would only get them killed later.”  
  
The Doctor swallowed, absentmindedly calling the bet and passing the turn to Skip. He remembered Skip was there, then, and leaned over River to give Skip an enthusiastic thumbs up. Skip still looked green, but less nauseous, anyway.  
  
“I’m sorry,” the Doctor said. “We just didn’t do diaries, so I wasn’t sure if you were —”  
  
“Trustworthy?”  
  
“ _No_ ,” he said, “I just…”  
  
“It’s fine, honey,” River said, “go back to your poker game, the ugly one in the corner is starting to get suspicious.”  
  
“But —”  
  
“Shut up, Doctor,” she said.  
  
He couldn’t tell if she was truly cross with him or just slightly annoyed, and it didn’t help in the least that she had to keep running her hands over him and nuzzling into his neck like some kind of — attractive — lap dog, because it just left him at the awkward intersection of upset and turned on. Not to mention River was hard to read even for him at the best of times, but now she was both, he was sure, hiding from him and acting for the group, and so he had no idea what she was thinking at all as she scraped her nails gently over the nape of his neck. He needed to speak with her, properly, before she did something she shouldn’t and he let her. It took him another call to finally dredge up the will to sit upright, dislodging River’s hypnotic touch and jostling her in his lap so that she stood up, peering down at him with a furrowed brow.  
  
“Gentlemen,” the Doctor said, leaning over to the one next to him conspiratorially, “is there anywhere the madame and I can go for some — you know.”  
  
He glanced at River, clapping his hands together in a way he hoped looked lascivious, but based on the way River just blew a curl out of her face to hide a sigh, it probably didn’t.  
  
“We’re in the middle of a hand!”  
  
“It won’t be five minutes,” River said.  
  
“I think I’m insulted,” the Doctor said.  
  
River stepped toward him, tugging on his bow tie so that his face was close enough to hers that he could taste the mint on her breath, and grinned, the expression all teeth. He thought that in another life, River would’ve been an excellent escort. Not that he thought she should be. Not that he thought she _couldn’t_ be, if she wanted to be, or — the Doctor barely resisted to roll his eyes at himself. Sometimes even he got fed up with his constant wittering.  
  
“Or I’m just very, very good,” River said. The Doctor knew she was playing a part, but his knees went a little weak.  
  
“I’ll fold for this hand,” the Doctor said, not taking his eyes off his wife. He was still cross with her, and he could see in the tightness around her lips even as she smiled that she was still cross with him, but she was still endlessly distracting. “But deal me in for the next, yeah?”  
  
“Yeah, alright,” said one of the men at the table, “that door, there. Walls are thin, though, so if he does anything you don’t like, Madame, give a shout. I’ll come relieve him of his duties.”  
  
River grabbed his hand to pull him away, perhaps preempting the glare he’d been about to shoot the guy, and lead him to the adjoining door.  
  
“But Doctor —” Skip started, but the Doctor waved him off.  
  
“Not to worry, Skip,” the Doctor said, “back in a mo.”  
  
Skip looked totally baffled, and the Doctor was not looking forward to explaining himself, although then, perhaps he was, because he was highly uncomfortable with his companion thinking he’d desert him in a dangerous situation for clandestine alone time with a prostitute. _Escort._  
  
The moment she closed the door behind them, there were some catcalls and other profanities shouted at them, and he blushed to the roots of his hair. She didn’t give him any time to flail about, though, instead pushing him down onto the bed and straddling his lap.  
  
“What are you doing?” he said.  
  
“They’re clearly not too pleased you left the game,” River said, “I don’t want anyone bursting in and finding us having a chat. Wouldn’t help either of our causes.”  
  
“Yes, well,” the Doctor said, tugging at his hair, “it’s more than a little distracting, with you all…” he gestured vaguely around her person as she settled onto his lap.  
  
She sighed. Despite their intimate position, she was all business, resting her hands against his chest and keeping enough distance between them that he was able to grab hold of one or two coherent thoughts. “When are we, Doctor?”  
  
“I just did the labyrinth on Haphraxis,” he said.  
  
“I’ve got that,” River said, “cheeky minotaur.”  
  
The Doctor rolled his eyes, his hands settling onto her hips without him quite allowing them to do so. “Only you would call an enormous mythical monster trying to murder you _cheeky_.”  
  
“Everything’s relative,” she said, and he didn’t really like the sound of that, “anyway, I’m nearly a professor.”  
  
“Only nearly?”  
  
“A year left,” River said. “I just saw you on Calderon Beta, for the eighth time or so.”  
  
“Alright,” the Doctor said, nodding. He knew about when she was, but it was confusing to him, because she wasn’t _that_ young. He’d expected her to be months from Berlin, or perhaps just starting her course. It had taken her many years to find her footing, and there were a fair few mistakes she’d made in the process, many of which he’d allowed to happen, despite his better judgment. But this River should’ve been far less rash — although of course, when did River truly do what she should’ve. “I know about when we are, but I still don’t understand.”  
  
“It’s not that complicated,” River said, sharply enough to make him cringe. “You seem to think that somewhere in my timeline, you’re going to come across a particular moment where I change. Well, spoilers, sweetie. There isn’t one.”  
  
“I don’t think that,” the Doctor said. “I don’t want you to change.”  
  
“Rubbish,” River said, “you went to great lengths to give me the chance to change. You’ve never forced me, and I’m grateful for that, but you have to understand that the things I’ve done, the way I was raised — they won’t ever just go away. There’s no finished product, Doctor. I’m all there is. The work in progress.”  
  
He squinted at her. “I’m not sure I follow. I don’t want —”  
  
“You want me to be happy,” River said, “so you don’t feel so guilty. And you want me to be good, so you can imagine that there’s some hope for someone whose ledger is as red as yours. I am happy, honey, and I don’t kill for sport and I try to do the best I can with what I have to work with, but you need to either trust me, always, or not do it at all.”  
  
“You’re wrong,” the Doctor said. She pursed her lips at him, and he sighed, reaching up to tuck a curl behind her ear. “I want you to be happy and good because I — because I — _you know._ ”  
  
He doesn’t know whether he’s ashamed of himself or pleased that she instantly knows what he means. He always wants to say it, because he means it, he _does_ , but it never feels like the right time, and he never has the right words.  
  
“Then love me,” River said, “and stop asking me to be something I’m not.”  
  
“I don’t mean to do that,” he said.  
  
“Well, you do.” River said. “We can travel the universe and save lives and do good deeds, but it’s never going to be altruistic for me. I haven’t got that bone in my body. I don’t like girls in cages or sad little orphans or people whose lives aren’t their own, and so I try to fix these things. It’s not compassion, sweetie. It’s all selfish.”  
  
“That’s not true.”  
  
She stared at him for a moment, her eyes hard and narrowed slightly, and when she reached out to fist a hand roughly in his hair, he started to pull away, but he was distracted by the image that flashed across his mind — River’s hand buried deep enough in his hair for her nails to draw blood, yanking him back and standing over him, digging her free hand and tearing into the skin of his face. It’s not the content that startles him, but the fact that he’s left wondering if that was her thought seeping into his mind in her anger or his own lingering mistrust.  
  
River leaned forward to kiss him, and he was startled and confused and frustrated with an aftertaste of fear from his previous thought, and at first he tried to push her away, but she just leaned into him and kissed him again, so he kissed her back. The moment he gave in and opened his mouth to her, though, she sucked on his upper lip, and the his lower lip, and then she _bit_ him. Hard enough that he yelped and reached a hand up to his lip to see if she’d drawn blood.  
  
“What is wrong with you?!”  
  
“You’re not _listening_ ,” River said. “And I don’t have time to do this right now.”  
  
“What are you…” he trailed off as his vision began to blur slightly, River going double before him. “River, you _didn’t_.”  
  
She shrugged, stepping off of his lap. Without her support, he fell back onto the ratty bed, the whole room spinning.  
  
“We’ll get you and Skip back to the TARDIS, sweetie,” River said, patting his knee. He tried to sit up to watch her go, wondering vaguely when he was ever going to stop getting poisoned by his own bloody wife.  
  
  
  
When the Doctor came to, River was sitting on the end of his bed, eying him warily. He wasn’t sure if she’d been watching him sleep, or if she just knew her drugs very well. He blinked at her, and then after a moment it all came back to him, and he scowled. He thought about sitting up to wag a finger at her, but he still felt a little tired and woozy, so sitting up seemed like a bit more effort than he had the capacity for.  
  
“You can’t just poison me when we disagree,” he said.

River pointed at herself. “Psychopath, remember?”  
  
“ _River_ ,” the Doctor said, clapping a hand over his face. “You are _not_ a psychopath.”  
  
“Maybe not,” River said with a shrug. “But I’m not _normal_ , Doctor, and I need to know that you understand that. I don’t think about situations the way most people do. I’m not even really sure I’ll ever be what one would call a ‘people’ at all. I love you, sweetie, and mum and dad, but the rest of the universe can go hang.”  
  
He twiddled his thumbs, staring at them as she scooted a bit closer to him on the bed.  
  
“This selfless love thing that gets all the poetry and god awful films,” River said, “I don’t understand it. I didn’t love anything for most of my life, but now that I do — now that I _can_ — it’s all a very selfish thing. I care when I know you would care, or mum, or dad. I try and behave because I know it matters to the three of you.”  
  
“Of course you —”  
  
“No,” River said, her voice sharp. “I don’t. I might, one day, but I don’t right now, and I need you to stop pretending I’m something I’m not.”  
  
The Doctor looked at her carefully, moving slowly to sit up in his bed and reaching out a hand to her. She tilted her head toward it, resting her cheek against his palm, and he stroked his thumb against her skin, watching her watching him like a cat ready to run at any sudden movement. He loved River. Everything about her thrilled him. When he’d met her in the Library, he’d been struck by clever and quickness, by her smile, by her familiarity with him, but also by her compassion for everybody there. She’d saved thousands of lives at her own expense but then, that had only been his interpretation. He supposed, from her perspective, she could’ve just saved his life.  
  
He thought she’d change. He thought, when she was older, she’d learn to love and care without taking in return. It made his hearts ache to think that she’d never truly understand the parts of her that were breakable and human, but then, he thought she perhaps deserved to be selfish for a good long while. He’d seen River when she was old enough that even he was somewhat baffled by the time streams he felt emanating from her when he stopped trying to push them away, and so there were many, many years during which she could redefine herself — but she’d also been forced into so many different roles, forced to be so many different things to so many different people for so long, he imagined she needed some time where her only concern was herself, and those few things that mattered to her. It scared him somewhat that she was so readily able to say that she didn’t care about anything but him and the Ponds, it made her more dangerous than he liked to acknowledge, and it scared him that she felt that way now, when she was older and calmer and in all ways recognizably _his_ River, but he didn’t love her any less for it. It just made him want to love her more, perhaps to make up for her lack.  
  
“I hear you,” he said. 

River searched his gaze for a moment before nodding. "Are we good?"

"We're good," he said. "We're great — hang on, what happened to Skip?"

"Everything went to plan," River said. The Doctor sat up and opened his mouth to protest, so she quickly added, "went to  _my_ plan. Let's not speak of it any further. I can only handle one row per visit without actually shooting you."

The Doctor decided not to argue with her about that and instead rolled his eyes, reiterating, "alright,  _fine_ , but — Skip?"

"He's fine," River said. "He's having a bit of a lie down."

"You're always scaring my companions," he grumbled. "Frankly, it's —"

" _Frankly_ ," River corrected, a hint of a smile playing around her lips, "it wasn't  _me_ who scared him. You may have been  _somewhat_  conscious whilst I was dragging you in here. He was shocked enough to find out you have a wife; I think it was a little too much for the poor fellow to watch you try to feel me up."

"Why would I —"

"I told you I was taking you to bed," River said. "I don't think you remembered the circumstances, and you were  _quite_ keen."

"You're lying," the Doctor said.

"I swear," River said. "You can ask poor Skip when he comes out of his room, poor thing. I don't know what you do in front of the people you travel with that makes you so unattractive in their minds, but there's continual  _shock_ that you're in a relationship."  _  
_

He watched her face carefully before responding, unsure if she's fishing for an explanation as to why he doesn't mention her — the answer, of course, is that he mentions her  _constantly_ , but he doesn't call her his wife for a variety of reasons, not the least of which is not wanting his companions to keep his secrets — or if she's just poking fun. He shrugs. 

"There's no one but you," he said at last, deciding to split the difference. "At the very least, for this body. I don't — there's no one but you."

Her expression softens somewhat, and she leans in to press a kiss to his cheek, her palm flattening agains this other cheek, and the split second during which her curls tick his face and he inhales the scent of her deeply, her lips pressed against his skin is so sweet and so  _needed_ , after everything. He wants to live in that moment. No matter what she says, or what she does, he  _knows_ River, whether she thinks so or not. He knows how easy it is for her to see herself as a villain, or a monster, because it's the same way he thinks about himself, but even more than that, he knows that she  _isn't_. 

"And you're alright with that?" River said. "You, the Doctor, with eyes only for an assassin who loves her guns more than most people?"

"You know," he said, sitting up further as she pulled away to place a finger beneath her chin, tilting her up to face him. She must have realized she'd been avoiding his gaze after asking when he did so, because she lifted her chin even further, almost defiant of the insecurity he'd found. He smiled to see it. "Whatever you think, whatever you say, whatever you feel, you  _are_ a person, River Song and  _you_ , dear, are the most amazing person I've ever known. You told me you don't feel the way you feel you ought to, that you don't  _care_ — and maybe that's true, and maybe it always will be, but isn't it — we venerate people who work against great odds to do great things. And here you are, guns blazing, and all you ever do is work against your instincts and try to  _help_ people."

"I don't —"

"I don't think it matters why you do it," he said, "because I have a great many self-righteous justifications and I do a great many terrible things, when the mood strikes me. But  _you_ — you just try to do good. I don't think anybody — least of all me — could ever ask for more than that."

"I'm not sure that's how it works," River said, but she smiled at him. He reached his hand up to cup her cheek, and she turned her head to press a kiss to his palm. "But thank you, sweetie."

He leaned in to kiss her, but before he could, she leaned back and stood, offering her hand to him and tugging him up as he pouted. River rolled her eyes.

"Come on," she said, tugging him out of the room, "you should be ready with an apology whenever Skip emerges."

"That sounds a bit excessive," the Doctor said, "I  _was_ drugged."

"You also tried to take your trousers off."

"I did not!" 

River laughed, dropping his hand and hurrying ahead of him toward the console room.

"River Song,  _you_ are  _lying_!"


End file.
